Currently, Pinyin input method is literally a primary Chinese input method. As compared with other input method editors (IMEs), Pinyin IME has its natural advantages, because firstly every Chinese who starts learning Chinese characters today has to spend a lot of time in learning Pinyin or phonetic symbols, and Pinyin which is primarily used to mark the pronunciation of Chinese characters can easily act as a code for inputting Chinese characters; secondly, Pinyin is close to spoken Chinese such that Pinyin input method can be learnt within a short time.
However, Pinyin IME has a serious disadvantage, i.e., a substantially large number of Chinese characters are assigned to a homophone and the similar situation happens to 2-, 3-character phrases; only one Pinyin code by one stroke can be inputted on the current computer keyboard. As the phonetic code length of a Chinese character is usually 2-6 letters with 4 letters on an average, 4 strokes are needed to be typed on any available keyboard to input a full Chinese character code. To reduce the number of strokes, an input method of abbreviation Pinyin or a hybrid of abbreviation Pinyin with full Pinyin may be selected. However, if abbreviation Pinyin is used, a large number of 2-, -3-, and 4-character phrases to same homophone codes will be produced, wherein the user has to turn “pages” in IME interface to find the desired phrase. A few years ago, a solution of double Pinyin was proposed; however, due to conflicts between the typing codes and the difficulties in memorizing, it has been literally abandoned by most of the people.
While inputting the Chinese characters, it is a dilemma to achieve both fewer strokes and minimum phrases assigned to homophone codes. For phrases with 4 characters or above, the number of phrases to the homophone is not so many, even if abbreviation Pinyin is used and the user does not need to scroll the screen to find the desired phrase. However, since 2-, and 3-character phrases are used most frequently and account for up to 60%, wherein if abbreviation Pinyin or part abbreviation Pinyin is used, there will be many phrases for any phonetic code and often a Chinese character cannot be found until turning the interface a few pages, causing a lower input speed and poor experience for most of the users.
The object of the present invention is to provide a solution to input 2-3 character phrases with fewer strokes and minimum phrases assigned to the same homophonetic code.